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Saturday, January 17, 2009

Roger Federer completed his preparation for next's Aussie Open by comprehensively crushing doubles partner, good friend and potential quarterfinal foe Stanislas Wawrinka 6-1, 6-3 in 57 minutes to earn his second Kooyong title.

No real surprise here but it's still a good confidence win for Fed before the year's first major. But the big question is: when did Stan leave adidas and join Lacoste?

Fed's longtime nemesis David Nalbandian is up to his usual tricks again. After a relatively non-existent 2008, the enigmatic Argentine stormed back to take the Sydney title by defeatingJarkko Nieminen 6-3, 6-7(9), 6-2 for his 10th career title. Regal Rog owns a 10-8 lead in their head-to-head and the pair, who sit in the same half of the draw, could meet in the semifinals.

Speaking of Argentines, Juan Martin del Potro has picked up where he left off last season when he won his first four titles consecutively and reached a major quarterfinal for the first time at the US Open. The 20-year old defeated American Sam Querry 6-4, 6-4 to capture the Auckland title and is the eighth seed next week. He sits in the bottom quarter of the draw that features Fed + Stan, Marin Cilic, Marat Safin,and controversial Aussie prodigy Bernard Tomic.

In a rematch of the Beijing Olympics gold medal round, Elena Dementieva won again and evened her head-to-head series with Dinara Safina to 5-all by pulling out a 6-3, 2-6, 6-1 over her compatriot in Sydney and earning her second title in as many weeks (Auckland). She's the form lady baller going into Melbourne and if her legs stay under her, watch out.

Congrats to Petra Kvitova who defeated her Czech compatriot Iveta Benesova 7-5, 6-1 to win her maiden WTA title in Hobart. She sits in the bottom quarter of the draw that features 9-time Grand Slammer Serena Williams.